Friday, February 13, 2009
spending the stimulus
rappers
where the money should go
my oh my…rappers are not in favor of how the federal stimuls package seems to be directed. in fact, they object, for the most part, suggesting it should be returned to the taxpayers, not the corporations and banks that led us into this mess to start with…here we go.
I have heard plenty from our new President Obama about creating new jobs—what I havent heard is how? Go to any Target, Walmart or big retailer and if you can find 5% of products made in America, I would be surprised!
Ditto for other products- be it the auto industry, or whatever.. Almost nothing is made here anymore due to the one advantage that overseas imports offer- PRICE!- The only way to get jobs back in the USA is to offer a rebate to the companies that are buying such huge amount of imports if they buy American products. The manufacturers cannot afford to cut their pricing any lower. Until we get jobs back in this country, nothing will change—a bailout will only put a bandaid on this situation—
barbi d, Portsmouth
Great question Bill. I agree this is a very tough time for us as a nation. but it’s a necessary transition. this is a call to action for the government and the private sector to work together and develop new green technology, a time for us to work in harmony as caretakers of the planet not cancers destroying the planet. years from now if were smart this will be a time noted in history as a paradigm shift, I’m suffering as bad as anyone, but I’m also very excited about the future.
Rww
This incredible financial disaster of mega proportions is actually so daunting it’s hard to fully comprehend.
The rules of business are simple, work hard and become successful or close your door. Under no circumstances should we bail out any private company, bank, etc. The government should have stepped in last September and purchased all the “bad” mortgages, renegotiated new loans, left people in their homes with a mortgage that they could afford. If any company went out of business because of it then that is how business works. This is not socialism, it is good business. You build your company, invest and reinvest to become successful. You do not rape your company for all you can, plus, and then expect any one else to bail you out.
The millions of small businessmen and women in this country have been the backbone of our financial stability for hundreds of years and will continue to be. It is a very simply solution to our so-called leaders; stop spending money you do not have, tighten your belt, budget (now there’s a thought) and go forward. The strong, well managed companies will survive and grow. The other companies do not deserve to.
Diane, Bristol
Give $100,000 dollars to each family! We could then buy a new car, buy a new house, or pay the payments on our current home to save it from foreclosure. That would stimulate the economy!! People that are behind on payments could catch up which would help the lenders that are not receiving their payments. Our spending would help all aspects of the economy. Let’s start at the bottom of the ladder this time. Give it to the people that are hurting first, not last. Let all the CEO’S wait to see how we spend our money. Businesses could take back laid off employees or at least there would be jobs out there to find. I think it would stimulate a lot faster from the bottom up !!
Kathy N, Seekonk, MA
The recession will work its way thru as it always has. We need the media to STOP screaming “RECESSION ALMOST DEPRESSION” at the top of it’s collective voices and scaring the pants off everyone. When folks stop being frightened, they will resume hiring, and working and spending. A lot of people are suffering, but the vast majority of us are OK. Stop scaring us, and we’ll regain confidence and get back to our lives.
Bill
I can’t see how giving money to big corporations like the big three are going to help those of us who have lost our better paying jobs and now have to live on jobs that barely pay over minimum wage. If the money is going to go to big corporations, that is not going to help me in any way at all. I still won’t be able to buy any big ticket items like automobiles as I still will have a very hard time keeping up with my bills. If Washington wants to help the economy give the money to us so that we can reduce our debts. That way the banks get their money but from the people who owe them money. Now the banks are not giving our loans or lowering our interest due rates but hoarding the money that the government has already given them. It is about time that corporate America learns how it feels to worry where their next meal will come from.
Neal, Providence
I hear all this talk of cutting pensions and bennys for all kinds of workers but what are they doing to their own bennys and pays you do hear what they are doing to help? I mean here our new president taking a 30 minute ride In air force one for a meeting. Why couldn,t he drive? I,ve always thought that if you ask for workers to give such bennys up you should be willing to give up them yourself first> My thoughts would be set the example from the top and show what your willing to give up and then ask your people to follow your example. As for the new presidents package it will most likely work If it is watchdogged and put where it needs to go and not paying off some ceo. I mean if the auto people need money they should be go to the banks not to the government. where the money could be watched esaier coming and going from one source instead of many where tracing it becomes more diffcult.
Roger m
I have an idea for a potential component of the impending bail-out of the Big Three that I hope you will at least look at. As we all know, GM, Chrysler, and Ford have tremendous unsold inventories. Consumers are wisely holding off on large purchases due to the economy and fear of job losses. These American-made cars and trucks are sitting on lots nationwide as auto dealers pay inventory taxes on them and lay off employees due to lack of demand for these vehicles, many of which are not exactly fuel-efficient. States are not collecting sales taxes on these unsold vehicles and that is affecting state budgets which are in dire straits. What is the fate of these vehicles? If they continue to sit on the lots, will they eventually be crushed? Maybe their parts will be recycled.
The Senate is now contemplating a bail-out plan for the Big Three. They will be given billions of dollars. In return, you will stipulate that they begin to produce more fuel efficient vehicles and jobs will be saved, at least in the short term. These are necessary and positive results of a bail-out, but the bottom line is this: We will be bailing out the Big Three with billions of dollars and with the exception of saving jobs for now and a promise to build better vehicles in the future, we receive nothing in return for the money.
And all of those vehicles continue to sit on their lots while hundreds of thousands of Americans wish that they could buy them, but do not have the means to do so.
My Potentially Crazy Idea
Instead of just handing over billions of dollars to the Big Three, give every tax-paying American a voucher of up to $25,000 towards the purchase of ONE vehicle from The Big Three’s current inventory.
Here’s how it would work:
I receive my voucher for $25,000 in the mail. I take my voucher to the local US auto dealership and redeem it for maybe a $22,000 Ford F-150 truck. I give the voucher to the dealer, He submits it to the U.S. government and he receives the $22,000 for the truck. I am responsible for paying all applicable state and/or federal taxes on the truck. We, the people, are now actually receiving something for the $22,000 we have given them. We are receiving vehicles that they couldn’t sell anyway! This would take place on a first come, first served basis until all current inventories are depleted.
What does this accomplish?
1. As I have already stated, the American public actually receives something in return for the bail-out money,
2. State budgets benefit from the sales taxes being paid on all of the new vehicles,
3. Employees at all American car dealerships keep their jobs as the influx of new business requires their continued service in the showrooms, service areas, and finance departments (to complete the government paperwork for this program, bill of sale, etc.).
4. All of the businesses related to the auto industry begin to thrive again as the citizens who have acquired these vehicles buy accessories, insure them and register them. This includes increased business at auto insurance companies and state Departments of Motor Vehicles which are now shutting down as states try to streamline their budgets.
NOBODY loses in this scenario.
IMPORTANT: It must be stipulated to the Big Three that as these vehicles are leaving the lots with reimbursement from the government, they be replaced by more fuel-efficient models.
A variation of this idea would be to stipulate that anyone using the voucher must trade in a vehicle that gets worse gas mileage than the one they are buying. This takes hundreds of thousands of gas-guzzlers out of circulation.
Well, there you have it…..my crazy idea.
Scott Y, Barrington
I surmised over a year ago that the gas prices (inflating) were not caused by the arabs but by out greedy stock market (future speculators). the stock market tumbled as oil is tied to everything. gas prices went down. the government bailed out the stock market (with our money) and now the price of gas is going up at 10 times the rate that it went down again. time for the gov’t to take the money from the big guys. we (CAN’T) afford to buy ANYTHING when the price of gas is ridiculously high.
Dougg
Why do we have this gigantic stimulus?
Why doesn’t the new government of Barack Obama help the ailing small businesses so they could reopen and rehire their workers instead of giving this stimulus to the rich bankers, CEOs and rich executives and why don’t we take back the jobs abroad that were supposed to be American jobs and hire the local American people especially the jobless. This will boost our economy. Motivate the rich to create jobs for the poor and give them incentives to go on. Use every resource we can to bring up our country back to where we should be.
If we have jobs we can buy our own products thereby balancing the economy.
And for those who do not like the minimum salary they can find jobs somewhere else. It is time to wake up and live with what we can afford. And when we have our jobs back try to work harder instead of being lazy and less productive ( I have seen a lot of us who are wasting so much time talking and socializing instead of doing the work).
Also, we the citizens have wasted so much money paying the high and agonizing interests on our credits cards and loans. We need help from the government. Lenders should stop bringing the interests up. Bring the interests at their lowest levels especially at this period of difficulties. We need to live too. Give the stimulus to us who paid these high interests. I think that this is the better way distribute the stimulus.
RR, Lincoln
What should the government do to end this recession?
Find the elements that caused it and get rid of them.
First we should stop listening to those who said we were in good shape and those who oversaw this mess but didn’t see it coming. Prosecute the Kleptocracy that was instrumental in creating it.
They rigged the casino of debt manipulation. We pay them for their profits as they pass the bad risks on to us.
The staggering odious enrichment accumulated at the top was built up on hedge funds, the leveraging of debt and other forms of financial speculation and manipulation while privatizing the gain and socializing the loss.
These are the people that dismantled regulation, engineered a fraudulent housing and debt bubble, creating debt instruments faster than an economy can create real wealth and conjured up the phantom boom economy. The same incestuous group that handed tax credits to corporations that sent US jobs offshore while suppressing and interfering with American labour, production and savings.
The problem is not freeing up credit but ending the practice of selling bad credit and spreading the toxic assets on to the next sucker and sticking it to the taxpayer when there are no suckers left.
They get the upside but do not share in the liability which gets passed on to the honest hard working labor they strangle. They don’t want to do the work or the research nor be held accountable for the bad loan to a college graduate with no experience for a startup company that looks good on paper but fails because of fraud or some other factor they overlooked.
Regulation is not enough
we need to prosecute.
Hold them liable
for the bad loans
they make.
Zuke
I think the economy would be helped by giving money right to the citizens of this country. You could give at least $ 50, 000.00 to every person over 21 who is a legal
resident of this country, and, it would not come to nearly half of what they want to spend( or have already spent). This money could be used to get caught up on mortgage
payments which would put money back into the banks, etc. It could be used to pay off over due credit cards, or other bills. It could also be used to buy a car, a down
payment on a new home. etc. The possibilities’ are endless and all of the money would help the economy, not just the board of directors of some of these large companies.
Betty P
First off, you can’t correct eight years of Bush incompetance overnight.
This country started going downhill when manufacturing went overseas.
There should be new manufacturing jobs created in the energy field,
such as wind turbines, geothermal, solar, even using the electro-magnetic
field around the Earth. At the same time get off the dependence on oil.
However, as long as there is easy money to be made by staying with oil.
It will remain the same.
Stuck in ri
Congress had no problem approving 700 billion dollars to bail out the fat cats on Wall Street with at least 18 billion already gone for obscene bonuses and perks to CEOs for doing a bad job.
Now the GOP (Gross Obstructionist Party) is blocking President Obama’s stimulus plan which will help the middle and working classes. Where were these conservative clowns the past 8 years when George W. Bush was sowing the seeds of our present recession?
Tony D, Coventry
ITS NO SECRET THAT NO ONE THING WILL GET US OUT OF TROUBLE, SO I DO BELIEVE THAT THE PRESIDENT IS GOING ABOUT THIS THING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION, DIVIDE AND CONQUER EQUALLY, DON’T FOCUS ON ALL ONE THING AND FORGET SOMETHING ELSE. ITS JUST TRYING TO REGULATE EVERYTHING THAT LOOKS TO BE SO TRYING. WHATEVER HE IS GOING TO DO, I AM BEHIND HIM. IF NOT ANYTHING ELSE HE DOES DESERVE TOTAL SUPPORT, FOR TRYING.
A LOYAL RAPPER
LARRY, SMITHFIELD
I’m not sure that anything that the government will, or can do, will bring this country out of this recession. Don’t forget, this is a global recession! Although, roughly three-quarters of our economy is based on consumer spending, we also need to export our goods. If no one else is buying them, there’s no need to make them. And if we do make them, we’ll probably buy theirs instead of ours, because theirs are cheaper. Did the last stimulus package work? Of course not! The only people who spent their portion of it (on material goods or services), were the people who don’t have jobs. The rest of us used it toward gasoline, so that we could get to work. This new package is the greatest rip off of taxpayers of all time. All it’s doing is expanding social services.
Denis, Fall River, MA
